Macromedia aligns with Eclipse

In a bid to get Java developers writing Flash applications, Macromedia is throwing its weight behind the Eclipse programming system.

Google vs Yahoo

An interesting flash tool that compares the search results of Google and Yahoo for a particular term...

Laszlo Training Event

Laszlo is putting up a introductory training course for the LPS on Dec. 2nd and 3rd in San Francisco. At $1600, it may seem a bit steep for an introductory course, but a look at the agenda suggests this is not one for absolute beginners. Should be worth the price, I reckon...

Now showing at Amazon Theatre

Amazon has just started a series of Flash based short films that are being shown on their site

Produced by Fallon the quality is slick and the idea is for people to buy the products placed in the films.

Unfortunately, for me, the credits kept popping before the whole movie was over... annoying...

But interesting...

Flex is free. And Laszlo is Open Source

In back-to-back announcements, Macromedia announced that Flex is available free for non-commercial applications and Laszlo announced that LPS is now open source. So things are becoming pretty difficult to choose between.

I think I would go for Laszlo...

Flash gaining acceptance?

I was just going through this post on Jonas' bolg and the InfoWorld article it touches upon has some really interesting statistics. The article is study on what developers are working on these days, and while ActionScript does not figure amongst the top used programming languages (though ECMAScript does), around 45% people mentioned that they will be increasing the use of Flash in their work. Now that is as good a sign as it can get...

RoboDemo is now Captivate

The new version of RoboDemo (...sorry Captivate) looks cool. One of my biggest feature request with RoboDemo was the need for a timeline based edit of the screens, looks like Captivate takes care of that. This would be a must have upgrade if you use RoboDemo...

Flashtival 2004

The fourth edition of Flashtival 2004, the largest Flash and Webdesign conference of the Benelux takes place on Monday 27th September. The program focuses on the international character of the conference and a number of the most well-known Flash professionals from all over the world will be present. Flashtival 2004 takes place at Congress Centre De Doelen in Rotterdam, Holland.

For more info visit the Flashtival site

BayCHI Panel on RIAs

Good to see RIAs getting some focus in the CHI community. If you're in the Bay Area around Aug. 10th this should be an interesting discussion to attend. And looks like Rashmi is chairing this panel...

Flash Lite supports SVG-T

So Flash Lite supports SVG-T and according to this article the SVG-T support was a direct request from its European customers and is part of the 3GPP standard. But as Russell Beattie was asking a long time ago, does it support Web Services?

BEA Alchemy

BEA Alchemy is an IE (browser) plugin that is being developed as a way to deliver rich data to thin clients and also help them work in an 'Occasionally Connected' mode. Jon Udell in this article says:

“The caching scheme is the heart and soul of Alchemy. Current approaches to taking browsers offline typically queue messages that later update in a server-based data model. An Alchemy application, though, always works with a genuine local data model that it stores as sets of XML fragments and navigates in a relational style. Bosworth’s hunch is that a Web-style thin client, driven by a rich data model intelligently synchronized with the services cloud, could do most of what we really need — both offline and online. ”

Looks like Alchemy in combination with Liquid Data is going to give Macromedia Central and Flex a run for their money....

Client Side XML Rendering of UIs

XML based definition of the UI in nothing new, but the problem is that there is no standard. There's XAML, XUL, WSUI and now even MXML...

Well according to this demo by Nik Khilnani of Funciton it is theoretically possible for the Flash to render the MXML on the client. Deng of course used to render XHTML and XFORMS but I've not heard anything about the project lately.

It would also be much faster to build applications using XML based UI definitions (I'm sure there would be those who disagree) and it may be a worthwhile exercise to explore if Flash really can be the rendering engine of choice...

Of course, ubiquity is what really what makes Flash an attractive proposition. 'Cause otherwise, there are already so many options available already (as the XUL aficionados will surely point out)

Macromedia Flexes its muscles.

Macromedia’s server-side products have never quite enjoyed the same kind of success that it’s desktop applications have (the exception being Cold Fusion, but then it was already quite successful before it became a part of the Macromedia stable.)

So with the release of Macromedia Flex, is this equation going to change?

Not sure.

Firstly, there is a very similar product in Laszlo Presentation Server that has been around for a while. But despite its potential, I’m not sure if Laszlo has made quite the impact it was hoping to. Flex is definitely has a advantage in Brady (the MXML editor) but the real challenge for application developers would be to justify the cost of an additional application server just to render the UI which in turn requires a plugin on the client.

Somehow, I’m finding this a little difficult to justify. Had the same problem justifying Generator development about four years ago. But then that was the dot.com boom time, and funding an ambitious online application was slightly easier than it is now. So the question is, will Flex go the Generator way?

The Singhsons

Absolutely, positively, awesome...

Found this via moik78 and I really had a nice laugh. Can;t stop even now... :D

Macromedia India Presents FlashClash

FlashClash is India's biggest-ever Macromedia Flash contest for designers and developers. Here's your chance to show off your creativity in Flash and take away cash and other hot prizes worth more than Rs.340,000. For more details check out the FlashClash site.

Macromedia VS WebEX

Right when Macromedia announced a month of free access to Breeze I received an invitation to try out WebEX for two week. Absolutely free. Looks like there a small bit of competition bashing going on here...

We use WebEX at work (and it has worked well so far) so there was no point in going for the free trial, but I have asked the sales team to try out Breeze, lets see what their verdict is...

MAX India

Brajeshwar points to the Macromedia MAX 2004 conference which will be held in Bangalore and Delhi. Nice to see India getting on the conference map, though my only peeve is that the Singapore event is a two day thingy and I'll particularly miss the 'Enterprise Application Technology' track...

Anyways, things usually begin slowly, and any beginning is good, right? ;)

The next version of the Windows OS...

...is now a very funny flash animation.

Work for more than 2 years to pay for Studio MX2004

Most people who come to my site looking for a Flash Crack (there is none on this site) leave behind comments that they are unable to afford the software. Now, sinc1968 has posted an RIA that looks at the cost of the software when compared to the GDPs of various countries, and apparently for somebody in Vietnam to purchase Studio MX2004, they would have to work for more than two years (and spend no money on food and other necessities) It's always a challenge with the pricing game for developing countries, and can't one work out a pricing/licensing model that is country specific, and use the IP address to detect the country they are using the software from, and disable access outside the country? I know, it sounds ridiculous, but if the price is right, I don't think people would mind it...

Mazda Transformers

Mazda USA has a cool Flash Site for the 2004 Autoshow. Check out this transformer animation that is part of the site...

Instant Karma (or Kama?)

Souldn't this be Instant Kama as Kama Shastra (Kamasutra) is the ancient India doctrines on love making. Any way, this is an interesting execution in Flash none the less...

[Via Metafilter]

Longhorn Demo

Scoble points out to a Longhorn Demo that takes you through a sample Real Estate Application using Avalon (the vector based renderer) Indigo (reliable Messaging) and a host of other web services which form the basis of the Service Oriented Architecture behind longhorn. All this is quite exciting in terms of technology, but it is introducing the same kind of challenges that Flash had during its early days with respect to consistent user interfaces. The zoomable map using a magnifying glass that enlarges the area underneath it, reminded me of so much of the early Flash days, when such effects were considred cool. Avalon might go though a similar phase where developers will be so much in awe of what is possible that they might go ahead a design interfaces without actually thinking whether the interfaces are actually usable. By the way, couldn't the Linux/J2EE group use a combination of Flash and Webservices (read Central) to achieve what Longhorn is aiming to do without having to re-write anything?

Jack Zerby learnt about web design from his parents.

So what did he learn? Well five things to begin with:

• Ditch the intro
• Big enough buttons
• No Stupid web forms
• Make it fast loading (can't say his own site loads quickly though...)
• Keep it simple

I think this is a simple but great portifolio site, that has attitude and good design. Good work Jack...

Graffiti Archeaology

MetaFilter: Graffiti Archeaology
Graffiti Archaeology Pretty cool flash app that lets you view photos of the same walls in San Francisco over time, as the many layers of graffiti accumulate. To anyone that has ever ridden the Caltrain, a lot of these walls should look familiar.
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Six year old Flash genius?

Just got this email via my site. Check it out:

Name of sender: adarsh rao

Message: Hi, I am Adarsh Rao (6 years old)studing in 2nd class, vidya vinayalaya school, Hyderabad. I have learned 8 softwares, they are Adobe products like Illustrator10.0, Photoshop 6.0, Flash5, Flash MX, Premier 6.0, Sound forge 4.5, Macromedia, Director8.0, Kinetic 3D Max studio 4.0, Morphing. I am certified in Flah designing & computer Graphics and animation with 94% and 3D Max from institue of Image Malakpet branch, Hyderabad. I made my website www.adarshrao.com and my school website www.vidyavinayalaya.com and has done several small projects.

I want to appear Macromedia Flash MX Designer Exam in December 2003.

I have alredy studied Flash MX bible and Christopher Hayes Flash MX Designer study guide. I have given practice test on www.forta.com several times. if you can, please mail sites for free practice test and any other books to appear
Macromedia Flash MX Designer Exam.

thanking u
adarsh rao
xxxx@rediffmail.com

I personally have not been preparing for certification, but a lot of you guys might have. Want to give pointers to this youg chap? Let me know. I don't want to put the email up (harvesting), but if anybody wants to encourage him, ping me and I'll send it across...

Stories of Krishna

The Seattle Art Museum has a nice Flash piece on the life of Krishna. The presentation uses the Indian Miniature style of paintings that give a superb texture to the entire piece. Looks really good. Also, check out the original Indian accent on the voice-over...

Shipping the prototype

Came across this old article by Jon Udell on Infoworld, that calls to elevate scripting languages like ActionScript, JavaScript and Python to a more respectful level.

“I am not only saying that you can do what used to be called "systems programming" in what used to be called a "scripting language" -- although you sometimes can. Nor am I merely lauding Python as a spectacular implementation of a first-class scripting language -- although it is one. My point is that languages like Python, but also Perl, Ruby, and JavaScript/JScript/ActionScript/EcmaScript, are strategic in ways that we don't yet fully acknowledge.”

I do agree they really do deserve more importance in the development process but the idea of using prototypes as final products does seem a bit too revolutionary.

They are very useful if used in pilot studies, and should be built in such a way that most of it can be leveraged. It still may not be possible with current development tools, but it would be great to have one like that. Develop in a scripting language and deploy in Java/C++.

Napster's Flash "Street" ad campaign

Boing Boing Blog: Napster's Flash "Street" ad campaign
Napster Bad -- not. This series of flash shorts on the Napster.com site seem to be a sort of animated equivalent to the faux graffitti ad campaign. Both the posters and the shorts cast that be-headphoned mascot as a hunted rebel The Man just won't leave alone. Sure, it may smell like teen spirit -- but Old Napster it ain't, despite the conspicuous attempts at street cred. Link
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512KB has a 5MB Flash Animation

num1000remix is smooth, high paced animation that looks quite cool. There are quite a few neat tricks there, which make it look quite slick. However looking at it, I can’t but help think, could this not have been achieved in less than 5MB? Maybe it’s the high quality audio, but still…

It's been ages since I've done animation myself, but the old school flash animators were so keen on keeping file sizes down. Is it no longer a prerogative?

Bosworth on occasionally connected computing

Adam Bosworth explores the various ways in which occasionally connected devices and programs can work while delivering an agreeable user experience.

“Let's start with a simple case that drives me crazy. As many know, I use and love a Blackberry 7210 for most of my work. I literally don't use a PC sometimes for days on end right now. Mail is a joy. The phone works well for me (I carry a backup for the vast majority of the US that ATT Wireless seems unable to reach), my calender works well. Only my contacts don't synch wirelessly (come on Blackberry!). But browsing isn't fun at all. I like to keep an eye on google's news. And navigating through it using the 7210 is really painful even when GPRS is humming and downright impossible on planes or, as it turns out, in Bedford NY when ATT wireless is your provider. So, I'd like my Blackberry to have google in the cache. Now if anything should be easy it is this. It is a nice simple hierarchy with subjects like Sports, Sci/Tech, ... and a set of stories. But there are a couple of complications. The stories aren't laid out at all well for a mobile device. Menus seem to go on forever. I don't care about sports. Yes, I know, that's un-American. Nor do I care about entertainment. What would the web services browser do?”

I think there are loads of good ideas there for building Central applications. Also I think Central should be available for PDAs as well as this is where occasionally connected computing really comes in handy...

PS: He asks where do expert bloggers find the time to keep posting daily...
Frankly, I've no idea ;)

Flash and Enterprise Applications

I'll be watching this closely as Sean Viosen is currently working with a team building an enterprise level application in Flash. At my company, I've had the opportunity to decide upon the technology to go with and decided to stick to a traditional HTML/CSS UI. You can call it chickening out/prudence or just simply a measure of the paucity of good Flash Developers (I don't want to be the only developer on an Enterprise level application!!) I sure do hope Sean blogs about the progress of his company. I would certainly like to know...

Rich UI. Is it really worth the hype?

Jon Udell looks at what the implication of getting richer UIs on applications means. He talks about his user experience with Windows 2003 as an example

<quote>

Most of my interaction with the software [Windows 2003] was dominated by two user-interface idioms: trees and tabs. The trees are, of course, the ubiquitous tree controls that manage hierarchies of servers, users, registry keys, and every other kind of object. The tabs are dialog boxes. These are both good and useful constructs, but as a strategy for managing complexity, they haven't evolved. Meanwhile, the Windows server products have gotten much more complex. Adding more snap-ins to the MMC (Microsoft Management Console), thus multiplying the trees and tabs, can't be the only way forward.

Jon is right to some extent. We desperately need to simplify the interactions. This would call for newer UI paradigms. Some that are much simpler and can effectively display information and expose functionalities. Jon gives Sam’s Fisheye Menu as an example. The disadvantage of introducing new interactions for existing functionality is that people need time to get used to them. And the best way to get used to them is if the interactions are present in the OS itself. Apple has been leading the way on this front. I and certainly wish for Apple to separate the OS and the hardware or at least, there should be an alternative to the MS OS (I know, I know, Linux) that can really lead the way with pioneering interaction design.

Color Scheme Generator

A nice site that gives you a tool to generate color schemes and even see how the colors will appear to visually challenged people. There is also a Flash version that I'd blogged about some time back but this is much better...

It's a Flash Animation about some monkey business

Researchers at Duke U are doing some interesting experiments with neural interfaces and monkeys:

Quote:
"Monkeys can control a robot arm as naturally as their own limbs using only brain signals, a pioneering experiment has shown. The macaque monkeys could reach and grasp with the same precision as their own hand"

[via Boing Boing]

Flash and Infopath vs Mozilla

Jon Udell at InfoWorld has this interesting article that looks at the pros and cons within Flash, Infopath and Mozilla as platforms for developing Internet Applications. Jon tends to feel Mozilla offers a lot strategically. I tend to agree with Jon. XUL is truly cool and Mozilla Firebird is a great browser, but as long as it does not catch on, I believe Flash is the strongest contender for RIAs

Get your own Tabloid Cover designed

Just found this silly Flash thingy via Boing Boing. Get a gossip magazine cover up in no time...

Cooking with ActionScript, Part 2

O'Reilly Network Articles: Cooking with ActionScript, Part 2
This week we conclude our two-part series of excerpts from ActionScript Cookbook with sample recipes on pausing and resuming a sound, saving a local shared object, and searching XML.
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Lynch on Central

Kevin Lynch is blogging after a long time and this time it is about Central. Nothing new there if you've been following other Flash blogs...

Cooking with ActionScript

O'Reilly Network Articles: Cooking with ActionScript
We've a diverse slate this week of recipes for ActionScript developers from the recently released ActionScript Cookbook: Our first is on formatting currency amounts; the second on using a unique depth when creating a new movie clip; and the third on creating timers and clocks. And check back to this space next week for recipes on pausing and resuming a sound, saving a local shared object; and searching XML.
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Making Rich Web Application Architecture Usable

Vishi has an article on Sitepoint. Good pointers and makes a nice read...

Disabling right click context menu in the Flash Player

Greg Wygonik has a tutorial for this here.

You can see it in action here. Will work for IE/PC and Firebird/Mozilla 1.3.

Macromedia Central goes Public Beta

aSH notes that the Mocromedia Central Public beta is out...

Macromedia Royale soon to go Beta

Just received an email saying that the Macromedia Royale initiative will soon go Beta. You can sign up here for more info on it or check out the FAQs here.

There is also talk about a visual layouting IDE (codenamed Brady) that will work with Royale. I thought Royale was for coders. Why would they add such an element into Royale. Isn't Flash good enough for that? Maybe this is built using JSFL, if so it makes a lot of sense...

Top 25 Innovators

CRN Magazine's list of top 25 innovators...

Macromedia's Kevin Lynch figures at number 9...

Quote:

His latest project is Central, technology that will create a new Internet environment for applications based on Flash, which is probably Macromedia's most widely used contribution to the Web world. Lynch says Central will act as a container for centralizing data from multiple sources,offline and inline,displaying or acting on it according to a user's preferences.

Quoting Lynch:

"It [Central] will unite applications in ways that developers didn't anticipate,"

Macromedia Central: Latest Developments

Oscar Trelles points to the latest Macromedia Central screen shot.

Meanwhile Mike Chambers has an article up on DevNet that gives you the latest update.

Looks like all the blogging about the lack of updates about Central got the MM PR machinery running after all ;)

.Net? Java? Flash!?

JD on MX: .Net? Java? Flash!?
.NET? Java? Flash!? An article at InternetWeek discusses how one project decided on the technology to complete a project. It has a catchy title (".Net? Java? No Thanks, We'll Take Macromedia Instead"), and I know lots of people are happy...
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Ten Tips for Building a Flash Remoting Application

Flash Remoting has not changed much for the release of Flash MX 2004, which is good news for programmers building complex Rich Internet Applications (RIA). Flash Remoting still offers the most flexible, intuitive way to add an application server to your RIA. Tom Muck, author of O'Reilly's upcoming Flash Remoting: The Definitive Guide, offers ten tips for building a Flash Remoting application that will help programmers deliver the most efficient RIA possible.

Flash JavaScript API Documentation

mizubitchy has a short descrition of the Flash JavaScript API language elements...

And a script that parses the xml file.

Can Lotus Notes R3 save the browser and Flash Plugin?

Ray Ozzie of the Lotus Notes and Groove fame has put up an example of what he believes is prior art to the Eolas patent. Meaning that, since Lotus Notes, a commercially available program was able to perform all of the functions mentioned in the patent well before the patent was awarded, the patent should be invalidated...

Can this save the browser yet?

[via Slashdot]

Does this mean the end of Flash plugin as we know it?

I've mentioned this before [1  2  3], the US software patent laws are quite unjust and open for a lot of (mis)interpretations...

M$ is getting badly beaten up on the Eolas case and for once you actually feel sorry for them!

People are already looking for the Flash MX2004 Crack

I was looking at my referral logs and it seems that a search on Google for the term leads people straight to my site.

No crack here buddies, but while you're here looking for it, why don't you drop by the Macromedia Store and buy the real thing. It's worth it...

Dave Yang has released a Class Browser for Flash MX2004

Cool, now you browse all your external AS classes from the Flash MX2004 Project Panel using the Class Browser...

BTW Dave, welcome to blogging...

Browserhawk Flash stats

JD on MX
Browserhawk Flash stats: This page came up on one of the lists today, with the implied question of "Why are these numbers different from the NPD version stats?" The only methodology I see offhand is on their reports page, which...
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Jef Raskin has a ZUI demo built in Flash

Jef Raskin (The Humane Interface, Mac fame) has a Flash Demo of a ZUI (Zoomable User Interface.) It's an 8MB Flash file so it takes a while to load. There are also some performance issues with the demo, but it gives you a fair idea...

Jef, understandably, did not have all insights into the Flash development process and mentions that he could not get Flash to recognize the left mouse click. He should have come here first...

But nevertheless it's great to see Flash being used as a prototyping tool. I think it serves the purpose extremely well...

Allaire: Blogging from the Baltic Sea

Quote:

"I'm just finishing a family vacation on the baltic sea, and am happy to report that the cruise ship has broadband wireless internet delivered via satellite, and Wi-Fi throughout the public areas of the vessel. Also of note is that the entire "shell" for using computers in the Internet Cafe is built with Flash, and they offer a Flash Communication Server-based video mail app for communicating with your friends and family on the mainland. Internet 2.0 trends following us everywhere..."

CNET Profiles Royale

CNET has an article on Macromedia's Royle initiative:

Quote: Macromedia is in the middle of an ambitious effort to expand the use of Flash--once seen mainly as a format for blinking Web ads--into a broad foundation for delivering Internet applications and building interactive Web sites. The company earlier this